Women Among Mohammedans. live very long together. (Westermarch, 519, 520-) On the other hand, in India, among the Mohammedans divorce is seldom heard of. The Koran specifies that the divorced wife shall have a sufficient maintenance provided for her, that her dower must be restored, that the husband shall have four months within which to change his mind; that if the wife has a babe at the breast, the husband, or in default, the next of kin, shall supply her needs during the two years of nursing. The law of Mahomet encourages amicable ar rangements, and these by money payments between the ill-assorted couples. (Sura, II, 229, 233, 226, 242, IV, 127, LXV.) The Koran lays it down that a woman after she is divorced must wait three months before she can marry, and she must declare whether she be with child or not. After a divorce it was lawful for the parties to return to one another, if they thought that they could obey the ordinances of God. A divorced wife after she had waited the pre scribed time, was either to be retained with humanity or sent away with kindness; a man who kept his divorced wife by violence, or by making her leave him part of her dowry, transgressed and injured his own soul. After the proper time the wife was to be allowed to marry again. Savary says: "The Mahometan who has thrice sworn to divorce his wife, religion punishes by not allowing him to take her again till she has shared the bed of another man. The faulty person, who is thus un pleasantly situated, endeavors to evade the law. He chooses a friend on whose discre tion he can rely; shuts him up with his wife in the presence of witnesses, and tremblingly awaits the result. The trial is a dangerous one. If, when he quits the room, the oblig ing friend declares that he divorces the woman, the first husband has a right to re sume her; but if, having forgotten friend ship in the arms of love, he should say that he acknowledges her as his wife, he takes
her away with him, and the marriage is legal; the too impetuous husband has lost his partner." The want of ready cash wherewith ta pay to the wife her promised dowry often pre vents a man divorcing his wife, as well as the odium that attaches to such a proceed ing; a man who without just and serious cause repudiates his wife does not easily obtain another; the severe censure of the Prophet also rests upon him. The wife, now-a-days, is entitled to a decree for a divorce for her husband's adultery, or his desertion, and for his cruelty to her, for any degrading act committed by him toward her, or if he threatens her with personal injury. Pending the proceedings, the husband must support the wife; and after getting a divorce the wife cannot marry for three months. The mother is given the custody of the daughters until they arrive at puberty, and of her sons until they are able to earn their own living. (51 Albany Law Journal, 317.) If a child is born to the couple after sep aration and the mother nurses it, the father must pay her for doing so, and if he is wealthy he is required to expend propor tionately for the maintenance of the mother and child out of his plenty. Should the mother die before the children have passed out of her care, the right of custody reverts to her female relatives, the child's maternal grandmother having the first right, and on her death, failing a sister of suitable age, the child's aunts. Should the mother be with out near female kin, the paternal grand mother and aunts have charge of the chil dren. If a wife without adequate cause and con trary to the desire of her husband, solicits a divorce, she obtains it only by foregoing her dower. (The Cosmopolitan, July, 1900.) Professor Robertson Smith is inclined to believe that in Arabia before the time of Mahomet a custom had established itself by which the husband ordinarily made a gift—
